


Secta Luporum

by Ezlebe



Category: Franklin & Bash
Genre: Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-15
Updated: 2012-09-15
Packaged: 2017-11-14 06:30:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/512328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ezlebe/pseuds/Ezlebe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peter likes to rationalize that the reason he never said anything was that he didn't want to be an obligation, but it's turning into an empty excuse for cowardice as the years wear on.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Secta Luporum

“I don’t think the _whole_ courtroom saw that,” Jared mutters under his breath, smiling uneasily at the shocked judge.

Peter slumps into his seat, and stares at the table. “Sorry.”

The judge is giving them both crazy eyes, and it’s easy to tell she’s close to going postal on the entire place, probably ready to find a shot gun and form a mob to go after Peter. Or disbar him.

“It’s fine, no one could possibly believe her,” Jared comforts, but there’s a sarcastic edge to his bright tone. “Probably.”

Peter groans, covering his face with an open palm. Jared looks over his head and can see that Swatello is glaring at their table, probably pissed off that Peter just ruined their chance of this being a quick and easy win for either of them.

“What just happened?” Cassie, their client, whispers, obviously confused and staring with some uncertainty at Peter.

Jared sighs, and reaches out to lay a comforting hand on her shoulder, “Trick of the light.”

“But that...” She begins suspiciously, but nevertheless - after a moment of silence - her shoulder relaxes under his hand and he can tell it worked. People often take the option to believe they made something up, rather than to be told the truth about the crazy stuff like a lawyer being a werewolf.

~

“I heard you two had an incident,” Karp greets smugly, falling into step with them as they get off the elevator.

Jared can tell it’s a close thing that Peter doesn’t take a swipe at him with his claws. “It was fine; no one got eaten, bitten, or otherwise scarred,” he tells Karp, pushing Peter towards their office. “No worse than that time you charmed that dog to talk.”

“I... That wasn’t me,” Karp denies immediately.

“Uh-huh,” Jared says placatingly. “I’m sure it was just a huge coincidence.”

“Whatever,” Karp huffs, turning on his heel and sulking back to his office. “Don’t expect me to help when he finally eats someone.”

“Hey!” Peter yells after him, finally reacting with something other than a petulant look. “You’re just jealous.”

“Sure he is, buddy,” Jared agrees absentmindedly, setting his briefcase on the desk as he steps in the office, and loosening his tie. He picks up a note that someone had left on his desk, frowning. “Hey, Peter, apparently someone in the office – Oh, Jesus Christ,” he yelps as he turns around to find Infeld sitting on their couch, somewhere he certainly hadn’t been just a moment before.

Peter looks equally surprised, hand poised over his phone as he stares at Stanton.

“Hello boys,” Stanton says brightly “I heard you won your case. Congratulations.”

“Yeah, uh... Somehow,” Peter agrees, shooting Jared a confused look.

Jared shrugs in response, already planning a countersuit of speciesism if someone is trying to get them fired.

Stanton nods a little to himself, leaning forward, and Jared can already feel the impending doom. “I also wanted to be a tad nosy and ask what Judge Reinhardt could have possibly said to get you so worked up during a standard propriety suit.”

Peter looks gob smacked, opening his mouth before closing it, and looking down towards the table. “Uh,“ he says awkwardly, then looks at Jared.

Jared just raises a similarly interested eyebrow, honestly curious himself. 

“It wasn’t- I mean it was-“ Peter fiddles with a few papers on his desk, looking away. 

“Yes?” Stanton prompts.

Before he can answer, the sharp call of “Peter!” surprises everyone in the room, and Janie bursts in, grabbing Peter’s jacket sleeve, and pulling him out of the room. Jared makes a belated grab for his other arm, but it’s too late and Janie already has Peter across the office by the time he gets near the door.

Stanton stares along with Jared, before turning towards him, “Well?”

“Well?” Jared parrots back, torn between giving chase and staying with his meddlesome boss.

“What did she say,” Stanton asks again, slowly.

Jared stares back, suddenly irritated, “I don’t know either, and right now I’m just busy hoping we don’t end up disbarred because Peter suddenly decided now was a good time to get in touch with the moon.” He scowls, groaning as Stanton gives him a mollifying look, “Sorry.”

Stanton hums and looks towards the door, “It _can_ be a bit sticky when mates are involved; I’m surprised this hasn’t happened before, quite honestly.”

It takes Jared a moment to actually understand the words, and he feels something heavy fall into the pit of his stomach. “Well, he and Janie are usually pretty good at keeping it out of the court room.”

He hopes Stanton doesn’t notice the fact his voice wound down into a croak towards the end of that sentence.

“Janie?” Stanton exclaims, sounding surprised, “Ms. Ross? What would - ? Oh, _oooh_.” He stares at Jared with narrowed eyes for a moment, before stepping towards the door. “Well, I really must be going now.”

“Okay? Wait,” Jared says and leans out the door, stopping him, “Are we good - no one is going to fire us, right?”

“Of course not,” Stanton reassures hurriedly, and then bustles off towards his office, snagging Karp’s sleeve as he goes.

Jared steps back into his own office and looks down, taking a deep breath, then grabs his suitcase and pours all the papers out onto the floor. Next, he carefully picks up the mouse from the mousepad, then violently sweeps everyone off of his desk and onto the floor next to the contents from his bag. He puts the mouse in a drawer and slaps both his hands down on the desk, hard enough that the resulting snap of sound echoes around the room satisfyingly. He scowls down at the papers a moment, then carefully steps over them and makes his way to Peter’s desk, doing the same thing until both sides of the room have been turned upside down.

It’s not a particularly violent tantrum, and he knows if he really wanted to do any damage that the windows behind him open just enough to shove that damned wolf painting through, but he likes that painting - helped Peter pick it out - so instead he carefully detaches it from the wall and tucks it under his arm.

He gets a couple of odd looks as he leaves the office, and Hanna in particular frowns as he waves at her from the elevator, suit jacket absent and vest unbuttoned as he twirls keys around his fingers.

It should be enough of a message to Peter that he’s pissed, even though he’ll probably think it’s for wolfing out in the court room and not because he didn’t tell Jared he had a mate, that it was goddamn Janie, or that it could have potentially turned into a clusterfuck in the courtroom on any one of their cases where she’d been prosecuting.

He nods to the security guard in the lobby and sneaks out the back door, ducking through the alley and towards where they parked the Prius that morning, hoping to get out of there before Peter gets done with Janie. Jared’s not sure why he’s so pissed off about it, but right now he’s justifying it with the fact that Janie’s always been kind of bitch to him, even before she started going out with Peter, and now he knows for a fact that he’s going to have to put up with it for the rest of his life. 

Or at least until she convinces Peter to drop him and...

Yeah, he’s just going to stop that train of thought at the station there.

The painting barely fits in the back of the Prius, and not for the first time he’s reluctantly charmed by Colleen’s little influences on Peter, even if they’re mostly partying and buying low emission vehicles.

~

“Swatello complained that you two are starting to do magic shows to scare the judges now,” Janie hisses as she pulls Peter into the elevator. “Anything you want to explain about that?”

Peter carefully avoids saying anything until she’s dragged him into an empty office, two floors down, putting herself between him and the door, and crossing her arms stiffly. She tilts her head, and he figures he should probably answer before this ends in a bloody tussle.

“It was just a little loss of control,” Peter insists awkwardly, glancing down a moment. “The full moon is tomorrow; I guess the pressure just got to me.”

“Oh yeah?” Janie says in disbelief. “Are you really going to use that as your excuse?”

“Well everyone does sometime,” Peter insists, rubbing the back of his neck. “It’s a pretty good excuse.” He lets her stare him down for a few moments before he breaks eye contact again, uncomfortable with the thick scent of anger starting to fill the room.

“Do you want to know why I broke up with you?” Janie asks suddenly, non sequitur.

Peter gives her an odd look, swallowing thickly, “Cause I’m a dick?”

“We dated for _years_ ,” Janie starts hesitantly, scoffing, “And you were always a dick. So no, it wasn’t that, but I think you do know the real reason, don’t you?”

“Please don’t say - “

“ _Jared_ ,” Janie interrupts, making Peter grimace as he looks down at the floor. She then takes a deep warning breath, but he continues to feign being fascinated with this wonderful carpet.

“When we started dating, you told me about the mate thing and I thought it was just some high school girl that you were being forced to get over, maybe a one night stand that went pear shaped when you realized the reason you picked her up," She taps his shoe with her own, promping him to look up, " And since I didn’t know anything about mates, I let it go, because hey, you were with me anyway. But then you never seemed to get over it; you never opened up and really let me in like you insisted would happen."

“That’s not-“

“Stop _lying_ ,” Janie growls, eyes flashing as she shoves him away from the door. “I was so angry, so fucking angry that you were hanging onto some _fantasy..._ Until we tried moving in together.” She pauses, swallowing thickly, and biting her tongue a moment before continueing, “That was when I realized who it really was, that there was no way I could ever achieve that with you, especially when you were over at the Cave every single night - Every single _moon_. I mean, it’s no wonder we only lasted a few months longer after that, because there was no way you were even trying to get over him. _Ever_ even tried”

“I do - I mean I have,” Peter insists. “It’s just - I can’t, I want to still... I don’t want him to find out and think that our entire friendship is based on some stupid werewolf hormones.”

“Then you should have left, never talked to him again.” Janie grabs the collar of his shirt, “If you want to get over him, you have to cut yourself off - Even pups know that.”

Peter looks away, the implication setting sour in the back of his throat, “I couldn’t do that.”

“Exactly,” Janie agrees, letting go and pushing him away. “You never could, which is why you need to say something, because at this point, jealously is really the only reason for him to still hate me.”

“Well, not the only reason,” Peter mumbles pointedly, because Janie hasn’t exactly hid her loathing of Jared either.

“And it’s been fifteen years, I don’t think you’re going to - “

“Twenty-two,” He corrects quietly, wincing.

“You’ve known your mate for twenty years... Twenty fucking years, ” Janie says, almost in awe, but it’s quickly followed by irritation. “Do you know how rare mates are? Do you even realize how lucky you are to have met him at all? Why the hell wouldn’t you tell him?”

“I didn’t know until we were sixteen,” Peter insists, and makes a face; the idea that he could never have even met Jared makes him simultaneously want to throw up and tear the entire room apart. He mentally steps around the ‘why’ question, because over the years, not wanting Jared to feel obligated to share his future has felt less and less valid.

Janie scoffs, and he finds himself on the end of a familiar sarcastic look, “You had to have known something was special before that; it’s supposedly like love at first sight.”

“But it wasn’t, he was just the coolest kid in the line-up, and - And that’s what my mom says,” Peter reluctantly agrees, after a few silent uncomfortable minutes. It’s the first assertion that what Janie is saying might be true, the first time he’s actually actively spoken to someone about how important Jared is since he’d freaked out when he was sixteen and had started to notice how great Jared smelled, felt, _sounded_ in comparison to the rest of the world. Since realized that it’s not normal to know exactly where a person is in a building or be able to feel their heartbeat from miles away. “I used to think she was just trying to adopt him.”

Janie gives him a thoughtful look, “That explains a lot, actually.”

“Explains what?” Peter asks cautiously, as anyone agreeing with his mother in any conversation was typically a bad sign.

“Colleen went from outright sarcastic when we were dating, to deciding I was practically pack when we broke up. It felt backwards at the time, but now it makes a lot of sense.” Janie’s mouth twists and Peter realizes that the anger that clouded his senses when she’d pulled him in here is gone. 

“I hadn’t even noticed,” Peter responds, trying to recall something - anything - but all he can think about is how much his mom still talks about her, her engagement to Nathan, and it’s suddenly looking less like she was trying to get them back together now. 

Janie bites her lip and looks up at him, and he makes a face, wondering what she’s going to drop on him next.

“There’s a lunar rave tomorrow, at a warehouse in Long Beach,” she offers, almost reluctantly, starting to dig in her bag for something. There’s a moment’s pause before she pulls out a nearly blinding invitation, splashes of green and yellow light trailing from a raver’s lupine eyes as it's handed to him.

“How the hell do you hide that in your bag?” Peter asks, surprised that he hadn’t noticed it earlier.

Janie shrugs, “You have to be a wolf to see the - ” She pokes at some of the beams, her fingers lighting up as if they’ve been covered in glitter, changing from green and yellow to pink and blue.

“Oh,” He waves the card around a little, trying not to feel like a little kid. “That’s pretty cool.”

“Anyway,” Janie mutters, rolling her eyes at his, admittedly child-like, fascination. “I don’t think you’re actually sincere about it, and the last twenty years agree, but if you were to _start_ being serious, then maybe you could start off easy.”

Peter looks up in confusion, managing to pull his eyes away from the dancing lights.

Janie growls a little, waving her hand, “Spend the moon somewhere else; let loose the wolf, join a pack for the night like the rest of us.”

It takes a moment, but the words hit and he sighs, staring down at the invitation. He forgets that he never actually spent a moon with her; that she probably doesn’t realize that the most ‘loose’ his wolf has ever wanted to get was refusing to get out of Jared’s bed after watching a Firefly marathon the moon before Serenity had come out. It kind of hits him then, how little he actually tried to make the wolf choose Janie over Jared. To make himself. 

It doesn’t particularly help that the moment he’s about to answer, he realizes he can feel Jared’s heartbeat getting further and further away from the building. At first he thinks maybe his senses are just being desperate, trying to get him back to the office, but no, that bastard is totally leaving him here - what the fuck?  

“I have to go,” Peter tells Janie hurriedly, reaching around and opening the door. She pushes him away and gives him an angry look, but he ignores it to shoulder past her and out into the hall, towards the elevator. He looks towards the stairwell door after a moment, but the elevator opens and he steps inside, nervously tapping his thigh.

“What the hell?” Janie asks as she steps in next to him, annoyance unmistakable.

He motions towards his ears and shrugs, hoping that will keep her from asking any questions, and it sort of works since all she does is roll her eyes.

When the doors open at lobby level, she yells after him as he makes haste towards the doors, ““Hey! You’ve still got my invite.”

~

Jared’s talking to himself as he reaches the edge of downtown, distracted by his thoughts and trying not to plan an escape route into Mexico or Canada or fucking England, when he’s violently shocked out of the reverie as Peter literally jumps in front of the car at a traffic light, breathing hard and red-faced.

“Jesus Christ,” Jared breathes into the steering wheel after he slams onto the brakes, horns screaming behind him. “What the fuck?!” He yells out the window, giving him the finger.

“Leaving me at the office? Seriously?!” Peter yells back, and great, they’re totally getting moving violations for this, judging by the police cruiser loitering on the adjacent street.

“I’m pissed at you!” Jared yells back, pulling his head back in the car and hitting the unlock button on the door a little too hard. Peter gets in the Prius just as the cruiser starts to move, and now they’re both angrily staring at a curious police officer as he turns the corner past them.

By the time the light turns green again and they’re a few streets away, Jared’s already back to thinking about ways get rid of Janie without hurting Peter. So far, he has nothing, the cheesy werewolf romance novels he swears he’s never read have yet to try and split up mates successfully.

“I thought you weren’t pissed about the... You know,” Peter starts off awkwardly, rubbing at the back of his neck. “It wasn’t even that big a deal, I mean, it’s not like I went all teeth and hair on her.”

Jared stays silent, because if he doesn’t say anything, then Peter can’t call him out on lying. It’s a win-win for everyone really, especially since Peter is apparently the one in the secret keeping business, and Jared’s not really ready to talk about that right now, especially not in a car as he’s driving 50mph down the highway.

“Seriously, I don’t even think _Infeld_ cared - “

“So what did she say,” Jared interrupts, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel. “I’m kind of interested, too.”                                                         

He resists making his own conclusions and bouncing them off Peter, since Stanton said it could be a touchy subject, and even though they went through an entire post-break up drinking session where Jared confessed some pretty upsetting things about how much he’d like to punch Janie in her smug little pixie face, he has the tact to know they wouldn’t be appreciated now. He’s also quietly ignoring the fact Janie wasn’t even in the court room, because the implication that Peter’s been pining after Ice Queen Swatello doesn’t do much except depress him, because she would _never_ go for it.

“It wasn’t really... I mean I don’t even really remember now, so it was probably nothing big,” Peter insists after a moment, clearly lying by the way his eyes trail across the dashboard and down to a flyer clutched in his hand, depicting a woman with disturbingly neon eyes. 

Jared pulls his eyes away from the flyer before he can read what it says. .  “Whatever,” he sighs, concentrating his mood onto the road, and the rest of the ride is so uncomfortable that he wishes he’d thrown that painting out the window, especially when Peter walks around the back of the car and catches it through the back.

He visualizes just walking past, but Peter literally stops him in his tracks with a confused look and a hand against his solar plexus.  

“Am I hallucinating?” 

Jared grimaces, “You didn’t notice it was gone?” 

Peter looks back towards the painting, brow furrowed, “Notice?” 

“When you went back to the office,” Jared says slowly.

 Peter hums thoughtfully, fingers tapping against the glass. “I guess not,” he says, equally as slow.

 Jared sighs, “You didn’t go back to the office, did you?” 

“Nope,” Peter answers frankly, turning around and shrugging as he walks backwards towards the door. 

“How the hell did you even know I was gone,” Jared mutters, rolling his eyes as he follows him.

Peter turns around, rubbing the back of his neck, “Just knew, I guess, must have heard the car, or something.”

 Jared mocks him quietly, repeating it in a higher pitched voice and watching Peter wince, “One day you’re not going to get away with vague werewolf excuses.” 

Peter grins smugly, though there’s something slightly off about it, and Jared suddenly realizes that the flyer is still clutched in his hand. He furrows his brow and goes to grab it, intent on answering at least one question today, but is distracted by Pindar’s sudden screeching. His curiosity is instantly forgotten as he and Peter make eye contact, rushing towards the living room.

 Inside, Pindar is fangs out _hissing_ at a mildly amused Carmen, who appears to be holding... Blood bags? 

“She mixed them!” Pindar whines the instant he sees them, his tongue catching on his teeth, and Jared bites his own tongue to keep from laughing at the lisp.

 Carmen turns around, shrugging, “He was watching porn on the couch, again.”

 Jared and Peter groan in disgust, nearly in sync. 

“Pindy, seriously?” Peter says in disbelief, shuddering as he nods towards Carmen. “What did you do?” 

“Mixed blood?” Jared guesses.

 “The boer and sirohi blood,” Pindar shakes his fists.

 Jared tries to make an expression of understanding, but he has the feeling his face just looks as confused as he feels, “Oh no?” 

 “Dairy and meat goats have very different flavor,” Pindar explain, holding out both his hands as if they’re scales. “It’s hard to explain, but this is a slight that will not go unheeded!”

 “Porn; couch,” Carmen says as she throws the bags on the counter. “Goat blood. You do that math.” 

Jared turns to catch Peter’s eye, maybe share a little commiseration that they’re living with crazy people, but the other man avoids his eyes and scratches the back of his neck.

 “Well, this is just fascinating, but I can actually feel my headache starting to form. Tomorrow is the full moon; I’m using my free pass to be antisocial.” Peter says, waving a hand as he retreats to his bedroom, flyer catching in the light. Jared frowns as he’s once again reminded that he still has no fucking clue what that is all about. All this mystery is starting to pile around Peter in a way it never has before, and he really doesn’t like it. 

Actually, it’s not as bad as right before Colleen had broke it to him that the Bashes were a werewolf family, but it’s starting to feel like a close thing.

“Is he okay?” Carmen asks, ever perceptive. “I heard about what happened in court. That sucks.” 

“Yeah,” Jared agrees halfheartedly, grabbing a beer from the bar. “The judge said something under her breath that set him off, but he won’t say what it was.”

 “Ah, how star-crossed,” Pindar muses. “The protective instincts of the wolf are very heightened in comparison to man and pyr, especially before the moon. That is why my people always took reprieve for a week every month during the war.” 

There’s an discomfited silence as Jared tries to translate Pindarese and neatly ignore the whole protective instincts thing without facing the fact that apparently everyone, but him, knew about Peter’s secret forever love for Janie Ross.  Well, the love part wasn’t exactly a secret, but the _actually forever_ part definitely could be considered as hidden, kind of.

Carmen reacts before he does, turning a frown on Pindar, “I think you mean _deceptive_ , and stop talking like you were there for that war, Mister Claims to be Under Two-Hundred.”

Pindar scoffs, arranging some papers in front of him so all their corners touch.

“Stanton implied it had something to do with Janie,” Jared mumbles quietly, unable to remain completely silent, even knowing that Peter has to be listening in on them if he isn’t asleep already.

 “Janie?” Carmen and Pindar both respond, nearly in unison, after a silent, painful moment. 

“I thought you were up against Swatello,” Carmen asks, raising a skeptical eyebrow.

 “Well we - We were, but afterwards Janie showed up at the office and pretty much liberated Peter from the most awkward questioning Infeld has caught us in since Gene Toy didn’t steal a rabbit, and then he says - Stanton says, I mean -  that the reason Peter went wolf on the judge is because ‘mates can make it sticky,’” Jared says in a rush, trying not to start yelling, because Peter definitely would have burst out of his room at that if he was eavesdropping.  “'Mates can make things sticky?'" He repeats quietly, even a little sullenly. "I didn’t even know he had a mate, why wouldn’t he tell me?” 

He runs a hand through his hair, groaning as the back of his head starts to throb, a familiar sign of stress. There’s a moment before he looks up and sees that both Pindar and Carmen are staring at him in what can only be described as befuddlement.  “Right? Did you guys know?”

 Pindar opens his mouth to say something, but Carmen kicks his ankle and he snaps his mouth up.

 “We suspected,” Carmen answers neutrally, leaning back into the couch. “However, we’re also ninety percent sure it’s _not_ Janie.”

 “Ninety-nine point nine nine nine - Ow!” Pindar follows, until Carmen punches him in the shoulder.

 “It’s just that, would he have taken getting dumped so well if they were _mates_ ,” Carmen asks, putting an unusual stress on the word.

 “Well,” Jared starts hesitantly, “He _didn’t;_ I don’t know where you were living, but he took it terribly.”

 That seems to silence Carmen, who raises her eyebrows at Pindar as if to say ‘well?’

 “Okay,” Pindar says, taking over and setting his hands on his lap. “Okay, so werewolf mates are a huge deal, like... Okay, if his mate had broken up with him there would have been way more than just drinking and singing bad covers of love songs.” 

“Exactly,” Carmen jumps in eagerly. “So she couldn’t be his mate because she didn’t have that kind of relationship with him, mates are literally intertwined in each other’s lives, to the point where if one of them left the other would just waste away. Or at least the wolf would,” she finishes, pointedly raising her eyebrows.

Jared's not quite sure what she's pointing out, though. “Neither of you are werewolves,” he reminds them skeptically. “I feel like you’re just describing the plot line to a novel and hoping it was right.”

“Okay, point,” Pindar agrees, pursing his mouth. Carmen glares at him and Pindar grimaces, looking towards the hot tub.

“For some reason I felt like you guys would agree with me.” Jared says eventually, slumping into the couch.  “Seriously, who else could it even be?”

“Well, there’s definitely no one else Peter has ever expressed any desire to spend his life with,” Carmen says dryly, and - although there’s an edge of sarcasm to it - Jared takes it as an admission rather than a slight.

 “Right? He was really serious about her,” Jared agrees, rubbing his temple. “I just want to know why he didn’t tell me.”

 He looks up again when neither of them responds for an unusually long time, and catches them in what seems to be a fight involving eyebrows and glares.

 “Well, Jared,” Carmen says suddenly, deliberately catching his eyes.

 “Yes, _Carmen_ ,” Jared responds sarcastically. 

“If you had to choose, who would _you_ want his mate to be?” 

Jared stares at her for a moment, then turns away slightly, because the way she said it has heat spreading up the back of his neck. He doesn’t know why, because he got over _that_ shit around the time they started college, and he realized that Peter would probably be able to tell the difference between general teen arousal and Peter-specific pining.  The only time he’d thought about it again were a sad, girlfriendless few months that led to being attracted to the nearest person, and then definitely went away permanently after he started going out with Ellen McCreary from one of his genreq classes.

Definitely went away, because he’s not pathetic.

Jared swallows, trying to get rid of the sudden dryness in his throat, and repeats those thoughts a few times, “I don’t know, just - anyone but Janie.” 

Carmen makes an irritated noise, huffing as she leans back in the chair. 

“Well, this suddenly just got a little more depressing than usual,” Pindar mutters, completely unhelpfully. 

They sit there for a few more minutes, all three of them staring at the floor, and Jared resists asking if they’re watching the same little bit of fluff fly around that he is, but ultimately concludes that he’d rather escape the tension rather than try to disperse it, and quietly excuses himself to his room.

 As Jared passes Peter’s room, he resists the urge to open the door and make sure he had actually been asleep for the conversation. 

~ 

The next morning, Peter wakes up feeling uncharacteristically miserable. Every sound for at least a block combines with the smell of various breakfasts across the entire neighborhood to create a terrible combination that has him wondering if he can call in sick for today, just to avoid the inevitable ‘that poor werewolf, he has moon problems’ looks from across every desk.

He shuffles into the kitchen, nearly knocking over a stack of shelves as he holds his head, slowly filtering out all of the extraneous noises and scents. The clatter doesn’t help much, and as he flinches away, looking in the room as a whole - Pindar and Carmen sitting at their desks, Jared making coffee - he wishes for a moment they were still just this, a little firm cut out inside the Cave, without danger of getting fired or worrying about someone trying to split them up.

Of course, that is probably just the pre-moon mood forcing its way through, making him want to do nothing but lounge around with his pack for the rest of eternity.

Still, when he walks behind Jared, initial goals somewhere around finding toast and pouring coffee, he instead finds himself plastered along Jared’s back and his nose in the juncture between Jared’s head and neck. He takes a moment to be mortified at himself, mourning the fact that he can’t actually beat the wolf instincts out of himself with a stick, before relaxing and entering a little sensory bubble that’s Jared’s scent under his nose and Jared’s heartbeat under his hand.

“Dude, are you okay?” Jared asks after a moment, and Peter feels fingertips brush across his wrist.

Peter mumbles something that’s supposed to sound like ‘totally fine.’, but comes out more mixed than even he can understand. He takes another deep breath, realizing he’s going to have to move sometime, probably soon. He leans back a little, just enough so maybe he can speak in a language other than Wookiee. “You should make pancakes.” he says slowly.

The resulting full body twitch out of Jared has him grinning, and the tension from this morning, and yesterday, seeps out of his neck and back as Jared jabs him in the side with an elbow.

“If you want pancakes we can go to the Diner,” Jared grumbles, trying to push him off.

Peter holds on for a moment longer, and before he can talk himself out of it, gives into the urge to lick a long stripe from Jared’s shoulder to scalp, reveling in Jared’s yelp and jumping back just as Jared turns around, shaking a spoon at him.  He’ll gladly field any suspicious questions with lies about pack behavior just to have his scent on Jared all day.

“I told you last time, that shit’s not funny,” Jared says with a frown, half-heartedly wiping at his neck.

“It’s a little funny,” Pindar mutters from where he’s working at the desk, sifting through some papers.

Carmen makes a nearly muted sound of agreement. “And the gold medal for obliviousness goes to,” she says an instant later, just loud enough that Peter knows it was meant only for his ears.

He glares across the room, but she’s been impervious to any sort of intimidation since the moment she met him. Even after they’d told her about the whole creatures of the night living among humankind thing, she’d just shrugged and continued eating her yogurt. He’s still not sure how he feels about that, since the one time he’d asked why she wasn’t scared of getting eaten, like a normal person, she just asked how he expected to scare her when he kept Jared around all the time. At that point he’d thought it was because she thought Jared was cute or something, but as time went on he realized what she’d actually meant is that he was sort of pathetic around Jared.

“Man,” Jared continues to whine, “I’m going to tell Colleen that you’re acting like a dog again.”

Peter groans, still wary of a speech on dignity that he hasn’t actually gotten since he was seventeen, but of which memories are enough to make him back off and slump down into a bar stool.

“Seriously though,” Jared asks, reaching up towards Peter’s scalp, but just as he nearly makes contact, his hand drops, and it’s a close thing that Peter doesn’t start whining exactly like the dog he’s just been accused of being.  Jared makes an aborted move like he meant to run his hand through his own hair the entire time, “You’re okay to go to work, right?”

“Yeah,” Peter grimaces. “Janie invited me to a lunar rave tonight, so I probably shouldn’t skip work in case someone from the office crashes it.”

He feels the hairs on the back of his neck stand up, and looks over his shoulder to see Carmen and Pindar glaring at him. He turns back around, rubbing the base of his neck and ignoring the urge to ask what the hell he’s done now.

 “Tonight? Like, during the full moon?” Jared asks stiffly, barely glancing up from his mug of coffee. “That’s cool, I guess. Is it some sort of werewolf thing?”

 “Oh, right,” Peter exclaims, and holds up a finger to signify he’s going to get the invitation and runs back to his room. When he gets back, Pindar and Carmen are still glaring at him, and Jared seems even tenser than a moment ago.

 “Is that the flyer you had yesterday?” Jared asks, looking up after a moment of staring at something on the counter.

 “Yeah,” Peter answers, sliding the invitation over the island towards Jared. “Apparently it’s some party that goes on during the full moon; Janie said something about it being a pseudo pack thing for a night.”

“A bunch of werewolves partying on the full moon, that sounds completely safe,” Pindar snarks behind him.

Peter turns with a pointed finger, “Stop being speciesest or I’m going to carry you outside.”

“You wouldn’t,” Pindar says, curling back into his seat.

Carmen scoffs, “Please, it wouldn’t even hurt you.”

“There are many instances of the blessing failing and innocent vampyrs being burned alive outside their homes,” Pindar insists, as if the sun isn’t touching him from the windows as he speaks. “You could start another war.”

“Whatever, Pindy,” Peter laughs, turning back towards Jared, who’s tilting the invite back and forth, a small frown on his face.

“So you’re going to go out?” Jared asks delicately, handing back the invite with an unusual expression on his face. “You haven’t really done that in – Ever.”

The wolf in him feels guilty at the hurt that begins to edge around Jared, but Peter plasters a smile on his face and ignores the urge to take back the entire conversation. He swallows thickly, reminding himself that it’s better for everyone if he stops taking advantage of Jared, even if it’s been going on since they were sixteen. “Yeah, I figured I could try it out and see what all the hype is about.”

 Jared hums thoughtfully, stirring his coffee _again_ , and Peter’s starting to realize that Jared’s actually pissed at him.

 “Oh my god,” Carmen exclaims, and they both turn to her, where she’s covering her face. “I don’t have any idea how you survived without me here.”

 “Neither do I,” Pindar sighs. “I feel sometimes that I should write a book.”

 “What?” Jared asks uneasily, next to him, and Peter quirks an eyebrow in wordless agreement.

 There’s a moment where Peter thinks Pindar is going to explain, but seems to back off once he actually looks over at them.

 “So, I guess you’re free to do whatever tonight,” Peter says slowly, turning back to Jared once it’s clear that neither Pindar nor Carmen are going explain what that was about.

 “Oh yeah,” Jared mutters, “As if I’ve had anything to do on the fill moon for the last twenty years.”

 “Well, now you can,” Peter exclaims, faking excitement. Jared isn’t going for it, judging by the expression on his face. “I have no idea what humans even do on the full moon, except I guess druids, but you’re not a druid,” he ends up saying, furrowing his brow.

 “Nope,” Jared agrees flatly.

 ~

 The ride to work that morning is easily one of the most uncomfortable drives that Jared has ever experienced with Peter, and that includes the time after Jared had just wrecked Peter’s car and then called him to get picked up from the drunk tank. 

 Law school was a dark time.

Peter looks ill at ease the entire drive, which Jared takes some comfort in, even though he’s busy fooling himself into pretending he doesn’t realize why he’s so pissed off that Peter’s decided to go out tonight rather than hang out with him. He knows it’s selfish, but doesn’t really care, and mostly just wishes he could counter Peter’s plans without sounding like a jealous asshole.

Peter greets their messy office with narrowed eyes and a deep sigh, picking up a few papers and motioning with them that he’s going to the morning partner’s meeting.

Jared takes a few minutes to straighten up, feeling somewhat guilty about throwing their shit on the floor, but he doesn’t bother to sort through it and just sticks it all on the couch. He figures making Peter look through all the papers is revenge enough anyhow.

Karp and Hanna keep glancing at him the entire meeting, as if they’re trying to figure something out. It pisses him off to the point that he very nearly throws a pen at Karp just as he catches another aborted glance, and uncaps the pen as Stanton starts discussing a custody case between two divorcing witch doctors and a zombie.

It’s a close call, but is avoided when Peter exclaims, just as Jared’s taking aim, “Are we talking about an actual undead person?”

“Well yes, of course,” Stanton answers, looking baffled at Peter’s ignorance.

Jared turns to Peter, who looks like he’s about to throw up.

“Dude, it’ll be fine,” Jared says, patting his forearm comfortingly, “We don’t have to take it.”

Peter looks up at him, probably imagining his limbs getting ripped off by a hoard of zombies, “But it’ll be in the office.” He whispers hoarsely.

“We’ll make sure to put up a bulletin,” Stanton offers. “Apologies, I wasn’t aware you had a phobia of the undead.”  

“It’s not a phobia,” Peter denies unconvincingly.

Jared nods to Stanton, spreading his hands and mouthing, ‘huge phobia’.

The rest of the meeting goes smoothly, with Karp and Hanna muttering something to each other but blessedly stopped with their creepy staring. Peter seems to have relaxed too, leaning towards Jared to mock the other partners as they usually do, with only a short rub against a temple to indicate that tonight’s the full moon.

 Just as they’re leaving, heading to their office to review a new case about boring and human thing that has to do with some rich guy accidentally cutting off another rich guy’s finger, Karp grabs Jared and pulls him into his office.

 Jared has just enough time to catch Peter’s pissed off glowy eyes before the door is shut and everything is disturbingly silent.

 “We have some questions for you,” Hanna greets, giving him a sultry look from where she’s perched atop Karp’s desk.

 Jared looks between Karp and her, swallowing as he subtly tries to open the door, but it’s locked, probably by the same magic that’s got the room soundproofed. “Well, lay them on me,” Jared says with more bravado than he feels.

 Karp scoffs a little, shoulders twitching nervously, “You and Peter, there isn’t any…” he makes an odd, nearly clapping movement with his hands.

 Jared raises an eyebrow, “No – Maybe? I have no idea what you’re doing there.”

 Hanna sighs at the both of them, rolling her eyes at Karp, “He’s asking if you know exactly why Peter did what he did in court yesterday.”

 “Oh,” Jared responds, growing irritable. “Yeah, Stanton gave me a few ideas.”

 “But Peter didn’t,” Karp says, as if he’s trying to confirm something.

 “He pretended he didn’t remember,” Jared answers, jaw clenching at the memory.

 This earns him stares from the both of them, Karp’s openly in disbelief and Hanna’s something more like pity.

 “Okay, that’s all we wanted to know,” Hanna says quietly, waving her hand. The noise from the office seeps in, and he hears Peter scramble against the door, shoving it open.

 He’s obviously distressed, staring at Jared’s chest for a moment before he growls at Karp, “Don’t do that again.”

 Karp puts his hands up and points towards Hanna, stepping backwards.

 “Jeez, Peter,” Jared says, brushing past him. “It was just a door.”

 “I couldn’t hear _anything_ ,” Peter mutters, still looking wild around the eyes as he follows. “I didn’t like it.”

 Jared stares at him, bemused, “Okay, you get one weird werewolf freak out per moon, and you used it up yesterday.”

Peter rolls his eyes, some of the tension leaving his posture, “I wasn’t aware there was a limit.”

“There is always a limit if it involves crazy,” Jared assures him. “Especially moon crazy.”

”That’s speciesist,” Peter says, cracking a smile. “I should report you to Infeld.”

“Aw but then you’d be stuck alone forever,” Jared argues, “And we’ve already proven that you suck by yourself.”

“Eh, I think I’d survive,” Peter says as he sits down at his desk, turning on his computer. A few moments later, Jared hears him mutter ‘Probably,’ under his breath, but doesn’t ask.

 ~

Peter decides to head over with Janie, ignoring Jared’s subdued mood as he exits the Cave a few hours after sundown, and manages to just avoid getting run over as she pulls in the driveway. The trip is unusually tense, the environment of two wolves in an enclosed space so close to dusk has his skin tight, and he hopes it doesn’t get any worse being in a warehouse full of them.

“Okay, so just be cool,” Janie starts, looking over at him as they turn a corner. 

Peter scoffs as he turns from staring out the window. “Are we in opposite land now? Since when have you been the cool one?”

 “Since you’re practically vibrating in the passenger seat and we haven’t even left Silver Lake,” Janie drawls, giving him a look. “You could have brought him.”

 Peter sighs, rolling his eyes, “I thought the point was to avoid Jared during the moon?”

“Well,” Janie says, fingers tightening on the wheel. “It’s not like I have any experience dealing with mate bonds, or the subsequent breaking of them.” She turns back to the road, shoulders tense. “My parents weren’t even mates.”

Peter reluctantly hums in agreement, “Neither were mine.”

“I didn’t even know they were real until I met you,” Janie continues, like the words are being forced out of her throat. “I thought it was a fairy tale.”

Peter looks over at her, takes in the tight grip on the steering wheel and the tense set of her shoulders, “I don’t understand where you’re going with this?”

“I don’t know either,” Janie confesses, eyes drilled to the road. “I just don’t to be the one who fucked everything up for you and him.”

“Well you almost were already,” Peter says before he can think about it, but the instant it leaves his mouth he wishes he could take it back, especially with the way her entire body stiffens up in the driver’s seat.

“Thanks,” she growls, “That’s really reassuring.”

Peter flexes his claws in and out against the arm rest, staring out the window. “You don’t hate Jared as much as you pretend, do you?” He asks, curling his arm towards his abdomen, forcing himself to stop. Janie glances at him but doesn’t answer, so he mumbles, “I don’t think he hates you that much either.” She raises an incredulous eyebrow at him, so he amends it, “Or he didn’t, anyway, pretty sure he thinks this is a date.”

“Great,” she grumbles as she turns off onto a side road, winding back towards the ocean, near a small outcropping of abandoned warehouses.

“So we just go in?” Peter asks as they park next to a surprisingly large number of other vehicles.

“Just one more thing,” Janie answers vaguely as she turns off the car, turning to him with a determined look. “What did that judge say?”

Peter glowers at her and hands over the invitation without answering. He opens the door to leave, but she grabs his wrist, claws digging into his arm.

“I will sit here until dawn,” Janie says firmly, “Seriously.”

Peter sighs, looking out the window, and grimacing as he speaks, “She called him a weaselly little… _fag_ , just after he had just manipulated her into admitting a witness’s testimony.” Janie is silent for a moment, clearly shocked, before starting to growl, and he looks over, nodding, “Yeah, obviously it pissed me off, and I overreacted a little.”

“Are you going to tell him?” Janie asks, leaning forward with a pointed look.

Peter makes a reluctant noise, wincing, “I don’t really want to; I pretended not to remember when he asked yesterday.”

Janie takes a deep breath, humming in consideration as she stares so hard her eyes start to glow, “Okay, fine; sounds like we need to forget people like that exist, and bane is perfect for that.” 

Peter laughs in agreement, rubbing his brow and following gladly as she leads him towards the dark side of a warehouse, tapping twice on an aluminum door.

The door opens to a half-turned wolf as a doorman, who takes Janie’s invitation and taps it with her claw, giving them a wide grin that wouldn’t have been out of place in the middle of a horror movie adaptation of Red Riding Hood.

They’re ushered in like VIP’s, a few wolves greeting Janie as the doorwolf shows them to a dual stair case - one side leading up to a balcony, the other heading down towards a dance floor - and he can see  another that winds around an upper level full of what appears to be gymnastics equipment. Peter feels like he’d find it all so much more interesting if his insides weren’t currently tying themselves in knots. He’s starting to suspect it’s not actually as much the moon’s influence as he’d thought, with the rest of the wolves around him alight with a thrilled energy that reflects along the walls, although that might just be a similar spell to the invitation. 

“I haven’t actually been to one of these in a few months, but it seems pretty much the same,” Janie says into his ear. “Just stay out of the pit and you should be fine.”

“Pit?” He asks absentmindedly, looking across the dance floor and finding the bar.

“Pit,” Janie answers, pointing across the warehouse towards a blocked off area, to where he can see a bunch of wolves essentially engaging in some super hardcore wrestling that seems to be slowly evolving into an orgy.

“Ah, _pit_ ,” Peter nods in understanding. 

“Other than that,” Janie shrugs, “Drink, hook up, whatever.”

Peter has to admit, this seems like exactly the sort of place he would absolutely love, if it weren’t for the fact he really just wants to crawl home and lay on the couch for the next twelve hours. Maybe marathon Arrested Development for the millionth time as an apology to Jared, who likes to watch it and pretend they’re George Sr.’s council. 

Instead, he ends up standing there for about ten minutes, not even realizing it until Janie comes back with a beer in one hand and shots in the other, giving him a disturbed look.

“When did you even leave,” Peter asks, taking one of the shots. He realizes it’s wolfsbane when it burns all the way down, and tries not to gag in surprise. “And couldn’t you have warned me?”

“You didn’t ask,” she responds, glaring. “That wasn’t even for you.”

“You’re too little to drink so much anyway,” Peter says back, grabbing for the beer. He reads the label this time, raising an eyebrow at the howling wolf logo. “Is everything here for... Nevermind, stupid question.”

“I’m almost the same size as Jared,” Janie says, rolling her eyes. “And I’ve seen you force him to chug half a liter of vodka.”

Peter rolls his eyes back, mockingly, “I don’t force him to do anything, it was just a - friendly wager.”

“Uh, huh,” Janie agrees dubiously.

There’s a moment of awkward silence, as Janie checks out a couple of dancers and Peter pouts at the logo on his beer.

“My head feels weird,” Peter confesses, slumping down on a rail. “Like I’ve had three more of those shots, and then a bottle of bane whiskey.”

"They have bane whiskey?” Janie asks, lifting her head towards the bar, face wolfing out as she squints at the labels across the room.

“I don’t know, I just remember trying it once and regretting it,” Peter mutters, groaning. “Seriously, fuck, I feel terrible.” He can also feel his face elongating unwillingly, despite the fact he’s not even particularly stressed or angry, just miserable.

Janie gives him a worried look as he struggles to keep from completely turning, his claws scratching at the label on his beer.

“When was the last time you were alone during the moon,” Janie starts conversationally, but he can tell by the slant of her eyes towards the dance floor that she’s starting to feel regretful, like she was in the car.

“Uh,” Peter starts, thinking back, “Rock camp, it was pretty miserable.”

Janie turns towards him, incredulous expression fitted upon her face, “When you were fifteen?”

“Yeah?”

“Fuck, I’m such an idiot,” Janie groans, covering her eyes with a hand. “This was a bad idea.”

“You were trying to help,” Peter says comfortingly, not really sure what he means. He takes a swig from his beer, or at least tries to, because apparently his nose is getting in the way. He has to tip his head up to get any of the beer, and it feels odd as he legitimately laps it up, “Shit, I can’t drink like this.”

“I didn’t even try to research this,” Janie’s continuing to gripe next to him, her tone mortified. “We should probably get you home before the moon rises.”

“It’s cool,” Peter tries to say, but finds his mouth full of teeth, muzzle grown too long to speak anything intelligible. He also can’t stop wondering where Jared is, even though he _knows_ he’s at home, probably. There is the chance he went out, which for some reason makes something inside Peter snap, and he suddenly feels very, very wretched.

“Peter, you need to stop,” Janie commands, snarling.

He’s unsure what she’s talking about until he realizes he’s whining. He hasn’t had this much trouble with control since he was in puberty, and he’s got just enough consciousness past wondering why Jared isn’t here to be envious of  the other wolves in the warehouse who can still maintain their forms.

Peter realizes he’s full wolf when he has to look up at Janie, who’s staring down at him with an unreadable look.

“You know,” Janie starts, kneeling down, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen your wolf before, it’s kind of pretty.”

She reaches down to pat his shoulder, and it’s surprisingly less condescending than he’d thought it would be, even though her scent is laced with pity.

“I’m going to call your boyfriend now,” She says dryly, probably to make up for being nice, and he snaps at her, teeth gnashing as she laughs. “Don’t you bite me, or I’ll tell him,” she warns, taking out her phone.

Peter can’t help but be ridiculously delighted when he hears Jared’s voice on the phone, and he realizes he’s started whining again after she hangs up when Jared sarcastically assures her that he can use googlemaps just as well as anyone else.

Janie flags down a waiter, who quickly sets a full beer next to Peter’s half-empty one, and sets some sort of martini and shot pair down in front of them.

“Well, buddy,” She addresses him, crossing her arms and taking a sip of the martini, “This officially got rid of any lingering feelings I had for you.”

He huffs, curling up and sticking his nose under his pant leg, resolving to ignore her and wait for Jared. When Jared gets here it’ll be awesome, and he can actually take advantage of the really fun looking gymnastics equipment.  He actually gets up at the thought, turning towards the equipment, and almost bites Janie when she grabs the scruff of his neck, growling at him.

“No,” Janie snaps, her own teeth growing.  “You’re going to stay here and own up to being an asshole when Jared gets here.”

Peter yowls a little back, because he totally not being an asshole, he was doing the right thing.

“You haven’t even thought about how this is going to look, did you?” Janie asks, teeth bared. “It’s going to look like you didn’t tell him because you _don’t want him_. I took pity on you because you’re not the only one who’s known him for years.”

Peter whines, because coming here was completely her idea, and he could be drinking human beer and pretending not to stare at the nape of Jared’s neck, rather than near-buzzed on bane and on the verge of letting his instincts take over.

His focus gets worse when he starts to feel Jared’s heartbeat, ticking in the back of his head like a clock. It takes every ounce of control he has left not to jump over tables and towards the door, to try and meet him halfway even though he knows Jared is still a few miles away, at least.

“Honestly, I have no idea what I was thinking,” Janie sighs, taking a beer from a waiter dressed in wolf ears and a tail. “Let’s be clear though, the end goal was not to get back together, you _did not_ still have a shot.”

Peter grumbles in agreement, clumsily pulling his phone out of his pocket with his teeth and tapping it with his nose. He has a map app that shows were Jared is most of the time, which Pindar had said was creepy as he’d shown him how to use it, but Peter couldn’t care less then or now about the implications as much as the fact that apparently he can’t actually use his phone without fingers. In the end he just breathes on it, fogging up the screen and wishing he’d been born human.

“In fact,” Janie continues, muttering in a sarcastic tone, “I think I’m going to start sleeping with Swatello.”

Peter takes a moment to break from his mantra of 'Jared’s almost here, Jared’s almost _here_ ' to wish he had the capability to do a spit take, because... What?

“Oh, you’re still paying attention?” Janie asks sarcastically, “The way you were staring at the wall, I thought you were practicing your laser vision; do you get that when you find your mate too, or is it just the dependence issues.”

He sets his head down on his paws again, glaring up at her and ignoring the other tables where it seems every wolf has realized he’s had something of a panic attack. It’s not his fault, really, this is... He should have just man’d up and invited Jared, who he definitely isn’t dependent on, because you can’t be addicted to people, even though he’s reluctantly relating the wolf coming out to something of a withdrawal symptom.

“Your boyfriend’s got amazing control,” someone at another table says, and he looks up to the sight of a brunette giving him a small smile before she turns to Janie. “I haven’t met many wolves who can keep their mind in full form.”

“Oh he’s definitely not my boyfriend,” Janie laughs, without even a tinge of bitterness. “But yes, he does have a good hold on his wolf.”

“Oh? I thought you said something about mates,” the woman asks, revealing her true intentions.

“I did, but I’m not sure what that has to do with you,” Janie says, slightly cold.

“Oh, um- I’m writing a book, not like a fiction novel or anything, it’s my thesis paper.” She smiles at them, though it’s less bright than before, “I haven’t had much luck finding many truly mated couples.”

Peter knows exactly what Janie is going to say before even she does, and he wants to bury his head in shame because he can’t even stop her, well he could bite her, but that would probably end even worse. He wonders how many other people have been listening in on them, if that waiter that seems to be on Janie’s shirt tails is taking notes in addition to tips.

“Well you’re in luck,” Janie says, grinning as she leans forward. “Because he does have a mate, but it’s not me.”

The woman glances down at Peter. “I don’t want to sound skeptical, but it’s well recorded that mates that aren’t together on the full moon probably aren’t mates.”

“Ah, but these two are exceptionally stupid,” Janie assures her, and Peter seriously thinks about biting her, because this was all her idea. “I’m Janie Ross, Assistant DA with the City of Los Angeles.”

“Amber Cooley,” The woman answers hesitantly. “Grad student at UCB, Xenobiology.”

“Do you have a card?” Janie asks her, holding out a hand, “I’ll give it to his mate.”

Peter gnashes at the edge of her skirt, because god no, please. Telling Jared is going to be embarrassing - and potentially life wrecking - enough without someone wanting to study them.

“She’s… late?” Amber asks, obviously regretting her curiosity as Janie grins at her. She eyes Peter for a moment, taken aback by Janie’s enthusiasm. He tries to look back commiseratingly, because honestly he’s a little surprised by it, too.

“Yes, _he_ is,” Janie answers, leaning on the table and smirking.  

“Same sex mates?” Amber says excitedly, and Peter loses the rest of the thread of conversation because _Jared’s outside_.

He grabs the invite out of Janie’s purse, jumps over the edge of the balcony and towards the door, with it tightly gripped between his teeth. He’s just conscious enough to know what he’s doing, to hear Janie’s irritated yelp, but most of it is just a blur until he’s at the door, nosing at the door wolf with the invitation. He doesn’t really think about the implications of a 180lb wolf jumping on a 140lb man but he does it anyway, forcing Jared to the ground with a thud and sticking his nose in the juncture of his neck.

“Okay,” is Jared’s first wheezing word as he gently pulls at the fur on Peter’s nape. “Janie was not as forthcoming with the explanations as she should have been.”

Peter settles further, trying to get as much of Jared’s scent as he can without crushing him. The overwhelming desperation is gone and he can think clearly again, but he still doesn’t want to get up, he mostly just wants to lay here forever and think about how stupid he is for listening to Janie.

“Seriously, buddy,” Jared says, “I think you’re crushing me.”

Peter reluctantly gets up, but not without tugging on the collar of Jared’s shirt with his teeth, popping the first button. Jared immediately pushes him off the rest of the way and frowns at him, grabbing the invitation.

 ~

The wolf at the door frowns as Jared gives her the invite, eyes flashing as a lazy attempt at intimidation, “I don’t know if you know what you’re doing, but - “

“I work at Infeld/Daniels, _move_ ,” Jared responds in his most convincing voice, the one that always has Peter up and agreeing on terrible plans or helping cleaning up after a party. Surprisingly, it’s almost more effective, her back straightening as she hands the invite back with a shrug, opening the door for him and Peter.

“Your funeral,” she mutters as they walk in, avoiding his eyes. He gives her a smirk, his hand still in the fur on the back of Peter’s neck as he’s lead to, presumably, Janie.

He’s not sure what is going on here, but one thing is clear: Janie is definitely not Peter’s mate, not if she had to call him here before the moon had even reached the top of the sky. He’s desperately ignoring the little voice in the back of his head that’s replaying his conversation with Pindar and Carmen last night, the sideways comments Karp gave this morning, because that implies more things than he can really handle right now, starting with, if nothing else, the question of Peter’s reasoning in not telling him.

Mostly because it’s been twenty fucking years, either Peter physically can’t think of him that way, doesn’t want to (which depresses him more than he would like to admit), or is an idiot.

Right now, taking the affectionate touches over the years and the amber eyes that keep checking for his every five seconds, Jared’s leaning heavy on the last option.

It does explain why it felt like Peter had avoided looking straight at him for almost the entire tenth grade, though, why Colleen is so keen on keeping him in the family and insists on... Fuck, he’s so used to people just treating them like they’re married that he didn’t even notice _Peter_ was treating them like they were married.

Janie, like the devil herself, appears at the top of a flight of stairs, revealing that Peter is actually trying to lead him to some Olympic level play toys and not to a table at all. He’s only seen her half turned a couple of times, usually when she was pissed at Peter, so the disappointed look she gives them is more intimidating than it probably should be, but he sneers anyway as she physically turns them towards a balcony filled with a bunch of half turned wolves and humans chatting and drinking. At least he thinks they’re human, it’s not like he knows, but he likes to think he isn’t the only human in the entire building, if just for a few seconds.

Peter seems to be pouting as he’s forced to turn away from the toys, and Jared runs a conciliatory hand over the back of his head, “We’ll get you some toys at home for next time.” 

He looks up to see Janie giving him an amused look and a strange woman staring at him with bright, excited eyes.

“Hi!” She says like he’s some sort of celebrity. “I’m Amber.”

If Jared were to jump to conclusions, he’d say that judging by Janie’s smirk that this is her fault. Granted, he’s starting to realize the fact that Peter probably owes her something like a million fruit baskets for leading her into a relationship that he probably knew was doomed from the start, but that doesn’t mean she needs to take it out on him.

“I’m Jared,” he answers slowly, holding out a hand. Amber takes it and shakes it so hard it almost comes out of the socket, and he has to reach down and flick Peter in the ear when he gets growly.

“I think I recognize you from somewhere,” Amber says, eyes narrowing.

Jared stands there awkwardly for a moment while she thinks, and glances towards Janie, who merely shrugs as she sips some sort of martini thing. It is apparently the latest in a series of other alcoholic drinks, judging by the slowly filling table. He reaches down for a half-filled beer, but just as he tries to take a sip, Peter swipes it out of his hands, both of them wincing as it hits the ground with a crash. The residents of the other tables are silent for an instant, looking over, but thankfully return to their conversations when it becomes apparent that this particular broken bottle won’t end in a fight.

“Oh!” Amber exclaims, “You’re like a lawyer in some law firm commercials, with the werelawyers phone number?”

Janie bursts out laughing as Jared scowls and Peter huffs next to him. An awkward moment later, Peter’s nudging a piece of broken glass into his foot in an attempt to distract him, and when he picks it up he catches the wolfsbane warning on the label.

“Great, I can’t even get drunk,” Jared sighs, putting it on the table. “Actually, it’s _we’re_ lawyers, not werelawyers.”

“Well it fits either way,” Amber insists. “Anyway, straight to the point I guess, since I don’t like working on the full moon and you probably don’t either - ”

“Do you need council?” Jared interrupts, looking down for a moment when Peter groans a little, flopping down on top of his clothes and staring up at them. He’s starting to get an uncomfortable feeling about his supposed earlier revelation. “Is this why you called me?” he asks Janie. “Because Peter _is_ allowed to pick some of the clients on his own.” 

Peter huffs, setting his head on Jared’s foot.

“I called, because apparently you keep Peter human, which while very sweet, is also what Amber here finds so interesting,” Janie explains sarcastically, smugness twisting with her lawyer voice as she nods at him. “I told her you’d think about it.”

 “Think about…?” Jared asks, a little annoyed by the vagueness going on, but it’s hard to let it grab ahold when he feels so much like preening at the compliment. It sort of magnifies the fact that Peter’s been taking advantage of his ignorance for way too long, but it’s hard not to feel pleased anyway.

 Just as Amber starts to answer, her face spreading into an overexcited wolfy grin, Peter howls, setting off about half the warehouse. Jared takes a moment to shudder, because no amount of years living with werewolves is going to get rid of _that_ particular instinct, before he reaches down and physically shuts Peter’s mouth by clamping it down with his hands and a stern look. “Stop it; take ten minute break from being a douchewolf.”

Peter stops struggling to get his muzzle open, and sighs through his nose, shoulders losing some of their tenseness.

Amber smiles in confusion as they wait for the other wolves to die down. “Uh, I go to UCB as graduate student, and I was just wondering if you’d like to sit down for a few interviews,” she says in a rush, obviously worried that Peter was going to interrupt. “My thesis is on the biology and culture involved in mated pairs.”

Jared stares at her for a few minutes, before he looks to Janie, who has the audacity to look a little regretful. “Well, I - Did Peter already talk to you about this?”

“No, he was already a wolf when I started talking to your friend,” Amber says with a sideways grin. “I was initially interested by the control he has over his form; it’s quite amazing.”

“Friend,” Janie repeats wryly. She gives Jared a suspicious look, “I’m surprised you’re taking this so well.”

“Oh, that,” Jared says, waving his hand. “Stanton told me after the whole thing with the judge.”

“Ah,” Janie responds, “That… Sounds awkward.”

Amber is looking between the three of them, confused but blessfully silent.

“Well actually, I had thought he was talking about someone else,” Jared says pointedly, to which Janie rolls her eyes. “Tonight cleared that up a little though, but I’m up for a threesome?”

Janie clicks her tongue. “Definitely not, ever.” 

"Because Peter asked once, when he was drunk on,” Jared sweeps a hand around the table, “This stuff.”

“And you didn’t catch on,” Janie says dryly, tapping her claws against the glass with a demeaning look.

Jared looks down towards a mortified looking Peter, or as much as a wolf can do so, and sighs, taking pity on him.

“Well I can be a little slow when it comes to Peter,” he shrugs at Janie, who sighs and tilts her head in agreement. “And while I am honestly surprised he hasn’t already switched back, due to his propensity for public nudity, I think I’m going to help Peter get his clothes.”

“I’m not sure what you’re all talking about,” Amber buts in, holding out a card. “But I really have to get back to my friends, so here’s my card, okay?” She smiles, canines poking out over her lower lip. “Call me, later?”

“Uh, sure,” Jared answers, tucking the card into the pocket of Peter’s pants, which Peter’s holding up to him in his mouth, belt still tied.

“Go, get him dressed, go home,” Janie says, slightly slurred. “I’m gonna - Go over there,” She points towards the dancefloor with an empty martini glass.

Peter gives Jared an alarmed look, and Jared finds himself reluctantly agreeing. 

“Do you need a ride?” Jared asks, sighing. “Cause you are drinking way too much, and this is me saying that.”

“I just feeling guilty,” Janie mutters. There’s a beat where Jared has enough time to make incredulous eye contact with Peter before she looks up at him, eyes wide. “I didn’t mean to say that out loud.”

“Didn’t think so,” Jared agrees, gently grabbing her upper arm. She doesn’t do more than growl a little, tagging along behind him.

Peter starts making a weird noise and Jared looks down, raising an eyebrow. Peter raises his back, and Jared hums in realization as he turns towards Janie, “Do you know where the bathrooms are?” 

She gives him an odd look, eyebrow furrowing as she looks between Peter and Peter’s clothes in Jared’s hands.

“I think Drunk Janie wants Peter to walk around naked,” Jared says wryly. “But I don’t think the DA’s office would appreciate one of their employees being dragged into a Franklin and Bash misdemeanor.”

“It’s near the bar,” Janie answers begrudgingly, nodding towards a purple sign declaring something in Romanian.

Peter doesn’t change the minute they step into the restrooms, instead trotting in nervous circles around Jared, size making it difficult for him to avoid hitting Jared every third step.

Another werewolf comes in as Jared’s muttering at Peter, and tries to muscle past them towards a stall. Jared finds himself a little more annoyed and a lot unreasonable at the implication that they are going to be interrupted, and stops him with a hand on his shoulder as he tries to get past him. The wolf looks like he’s about the literally throw Jared across the room, but stops when Jared starts talking. “Get. Out. We are about to have a discussion.”

“But it’s a public bathroom,” The wolf mutters weakly, backing up.

“ ** _Out_** ,” Jared insists, threading it with as much command as he can muster.

The wolf practically flees out the door, and Jared catches Janie’s confused look sitting on the bench outside as the door swings.

“Okay that’s twice in one night, I suddenly feel like a huge badass,” Jared mutters as Peter starts running around in circles again. “Stop it,” Jared tries to demand, grabbing for the hair on Peter’s nape, trying to get him to stand still, but instead he ends up just getting dragged down by the heavier wolf. Peter finally stops to stares at him for a moment, breathing hard. “Why the hell doesn’t the magic voice work when I actually want you to do something?” Jared grumbles.

Peter doesn’t move, and seems to barely be breathing as he stares down at Jared, feet planted firmly as if Jared was going to try and move him.

“Okay, I get it, you don’t want to talk,” Jared says, sitting up on his elbows, “So luckily I can talk enough for the both of us.” 

Peter sighs, slumping down on Jared’s chest and knocking the wind out of him.

“Haha,” Jared mutters hoarsely. “Seriously, I’m going to wake up tomorrow and my entire chest will just be a huge bruise.”

Peter tilts his head, eyes boring in to Jared.

Jared sighs, figuring if he’s going to lay it all out he better do it now, “Yesterday, Stanton said that the whole thing in court was a mate thing, and then I thought it was Janie, but she called me and said you needed _me_ , to which I sort of figured everything out.”

Peter huffs a little, diverting his eyes to an empty stall.

“And I’ve been jealous, like the entire time,” Jared says quietly, hoping that Peter understands that the whole time, means the _whole time_. “I’m pretty low key about it in comparison to you, who I’m starting to realize seemed to literally scare off most of my semi-serious girlfriends.” Peter narrows his eyes and him and he narrows his back, not to be intimidated by a man who’s retreating from feelings inside of a body that can’t even talk. “Seriously, the longer you went out with Janie the more I wanted to throw her under a bus, and since she’s a werewolf it probably wouldn’t have even done lasting damage.”

Peter seems amused by that, before his ears twitch towards the door, and then back to Jared.

“Oh yeah, I thought about it,” Jared continues, louder. “I drew out plans,” he taps his temple, nodding, “And I know she listening to this too, you wolves have zero sense of privacy.”

He stays silent for a few moments, wondering if he should lay all his cards on the table right here, in the middle of a rather grungy bathroom, for half the wolf population in Los Angeles to potentially interrupt. He glances down at Peter, who’s staring at the sinks as if they hold all the answers in the universe and still wearing his wolf form like emotional armor. 

“Okay, fine,” Jared mutters, huffing enough that the inhalation displaces Peter’s balance. “You, Peter, have been in one of my top three jerk-off fantasies since we were at least sixteen. I have had equally as many fantasies involving _feelings_ for at least that long, which have persisted despite my attempts at burying them, and... And I regularly tell people I’m with you to get them to back off.” He takes a deep breath, “And Pindar hacked our Facebooks a month ago and changed out status to married, but I haven’t said anything because I like the thought too much.”

Peter turns to him, finally, his little wolfy eyebrows going up in disbelief.

“The bathroom is now a confessional, Janie has officially been witness to my dirty laundry being flung everywhere, and you’re still a wolf.” Jared covers his face with a hand. "Awesome," he sighs deeply. 

He feels Peter get off his chest, realizes that the weight had been somewhat comforting just as it leaves, and screws his eyes shut, because if he’s reading this wrong then he’s probably just fucked the last twenty or so years of friendship up. He’s ninety-nine percent sure he hasn’t, but it’s always that extra percent that eats at him after he opens his mouth.

He listens to Peter get dressed, and tries not to panic when he still doesn’t saying anything.

“Pindar would be horrified that you’re lying on this floor,” Peter finally says, which, Jared would state officially, is probably in the top ten worst things to say when someone’s just told you they’ve practically been in love with you for decades.

“I hate you,” Jared mutters, because now he’s thinking about what’s on the floor, too.

“You don’t,” Peter says happily, dragging him up by his arm until he’s vertical, and then pushing him up against the wall. “You really don’t,” Peter says in a suggestive whisper, right into his ear.

“I’m kind of ashamed of being into your totally cheesy moves,” Jared laughs breathlessly, tilting his head up to look Peter in the eyes.

“They’re not cheesy,” Peter disagrees, tilting his head down to complement Jared’s, so that each word practically brushes across his lips, “They’re _effective_.”

Jared grins, surprised at how easy he finds it to lift his head and press his lips against Peter’s, to grab the back of his neck and pull him down so they’re both leaning against the wall. He lets his other hand wander around Peter’s open shirt front, no doubt left that way on purpose as some sort of enticement.

Peter kisses like Jared’s about to escape, hands clinging to his shirt, mouth open and eager against his with a force so powerful he knows he’s going to have bruises tomorrow.

Jared groans as Peter moves from his mouth to his throat, wolf teeth sharp against his skin. A hand digs into the back of his neck where Peter ran his tongue up this morning, a memory which is suddenly put in stark relief as proof of his willful ignorance.

He’s got one hand combing through Peter’s hair and the other teasing at his unbelted waistband when Janie starts banging on the door, yelling something that Jared really could care less about, right now.

Peter, on the other hand, apparently still has some kind of shame, because he freezes his assault on Jared’s neck and ignores his garbled protests at the halt.

He whines as Peter pulls completely away, looking embarrassed. “We shouldn’t do this in a dingy club bathroom.”

“Why not?” Jared disagrees, “It’s very trendy, I hear.” 

“Get out here!” Janie yells, probably just listening in and being a total cockblock. “I don’t know what you said to this guy but I think he’s getting security.”

“There’s security?” Jared says as he picks up Peter’s jacket, handing it to him, “But you’re werewolves.”

Peter gives him a disappointed look, pulling on the jacket and opening the door.

“We should probably go,” Janie says matter of fact, pointing lazily at the door. Jared is about to make fun of her when he realizes she has a drink in her hand, large and the color of rust.

“Janie, I said no more drinks,” Jared frowns in disapproval.

Janie makes the same frown back, pointedly taking a long swig. “Some guy gave it to me,” she says smugly, after nearly choking, and Peter gently pushes her towards the door. “It’s called a tiger jack. I like it.”

“Yes, we could tell,” Peter says, and when Jared turns to nod in agreement, he notices that Peter’s features have shifted to something more wolf again.

“Hey, your face is all,” Jared makes a gesture towards his own, drawing his fingers back in an imitation of a snout.

“Shut up, it’s the full moon,” Peter says, but he doesn’t sound very convinced himself.

“Aw,” Jared mocks, “Did you get worked up?”

“Oh, like you didn’t,” Peter taunts back. He snarls at another wolf who jostles him as they make their way to the exit, which for some reason makes Janie start laughing so hard that Jared has to bite his lips to keep from doing so himself. It’s also when he notices she’s still got her glass, near empty, and gently pulls it away from her. He sets it on a nearby table with an amiable grin at the occupants.

“I have decided to forgive you,” Janie slurs as they walk her towards the car. “Because I like when people are happy; even Jared sometimes.”

“That’s great Janie,” Jared snorts, shaking his head as he pulls out his keys. “I’m glad I get a sometimes.”

Peter groans as they turn the corner, presumably from the sight of the Bronco parked across the street.

“Come on, it’s not that bad,” Janie says brightly, “It’s yellow and square. Like cheese!” She holds her hands out like it’s some sort of amazing omen.

“Damn, I feel like I should start recording this,” Jared says in disbelief. “That bane really knocks you guys around, doesn’t it?”

“Apparently,” Peter agrees as they shove her in the backseat.

“Don’t ‘ _apparently’_ me,” Jared huffs, pulling himself into the driver seat. “You don’t remember that time Colleen sent whiskey and you drank like half of it ‘cause I dared you?”

Peter is silent for a moment, “No.”

“Liar!” Janie exclaims from the backseat, scaring the hell out of Jared so much that he slams on the breaks and Peter nearly hits his head on the dash.

“Put your seatbelt on,” Jared scolds, “Click it or ticket.”

“He talked about that like two hours ago,” Janie continues, loud and accusatory. She sounds like she does when she’s yelling about them doing something stupid in court. “He said he regretted it.”

“That’s because he went back and forth between thinking the hot tub was a giant margarita to being some sort of geyser,” Jared tells her, looking over his shoulder. “I should have recorded _that_.”

Janie snorts, “Pindar has so many cameras in that house it probably _is_ recorded.”

“Better not be,” Peter mutters, casually stretching his arm along the back seat.

Jared eyes it for a moment before shifting his shoulders enough that he can lean back into it, “You’re not subtle.”

“Don’t have to be,” Peter says smugly, wolfy grin on his face.

There’s a groan from the back seat, Janie muttering, “Your ego can be seen from _space_.”

“Are we taking her home or her house?” Jared asks, shuddering as Peter cards a hand through his hair. He looks in the mirror when Janie doesn’t offer some smart remark about their house being hell, and finds her staring with wide eyes at something in the sky. When he follows her gaze and finds the moon, he sighs, “Home?”

“Yeah,” Peter agrees quietly, “I don’t think she could actually accidentally kill herself but it’s better to not take the chance, right?”

“I guess,” Jared agrees unenthusiastically. He groans when his hair is pulled again, and glances over to see Peter staring at him. “What?”

Peter sighs, “It made sense when I was a kid, you know?”

Jared toys with the idea of pretending he doesn’t understand, but instead leans into the hand that’s stopped carding through his hair and shrugs, “This is why I’m the one who makes plans, you should’ve just said something.”

“Janie said you’d think it was because I didn’t want you,” Peter murmurs, giving the back seat a fleeting look.

Jared grimaces, “I kind of did, for a few minutes.” He glances over again to see Peter looking distressed, “But then I realized if that was true, you wouldn’t have been here this long.”

Peter hums, “What do you mean?”

Jared sighs deeply, fingers tightening on the wheel, “We own a house, the bills have both our names, people only send one invitation to either of us, expecting the other to be there,” he says in a rush. “We even have rings.”

 “That’s for the juries,” Peter argues unconvincingly, as if this is news to him, too.

 “Anyway, I realized pretty quick this was just you being stupid about feelings.”

 Peter frowns, “Then this should be even ground here; you didn’t say anything to me either.”

 “Well, I didn’t lie about anything,” Jared says stiffly, because Peter had lied, a lot.

 Peter swallows, looking deflated, “Fine, I’ll take the blame for this one.”

 “And you owe me a new shirt,” Jared says pointedly, reaching up and grabbing his own collar where Peter had ripped the button out.

 Peter takes his hand off the back of Jared’s neck, grabbing the fabric edge and pulling on it, “I kind of like it.”

 “If you want me to take my clothes off, you only need to ask,” Jared says smartly, giving Peter a look as he moves to unbutton the next one.

 “Driving, you’re driving,” Peter says after a moment of staring, and Jared gets the feeling it was mostly to himself more than him.

 Jared laughs, tilting his head towards Peter, “We’re almost home anyway.”

 “Do you look like a man-boy, or like a proportionally tiny man?” Janie asks, shoving Peter’s arm out of the way and popping her head over the seat. “I’ve always wondered.”

Jared scowls, pushing her backwards toward her seat without looking and snatching his hand back when he hears her growl. “Why aren’t you passed out yet,” he wonders as he pulls up the driveway. ‘You’re personality is being a total tool when you’re drunk.”

“You mean I turn into you?” Janie responds with an exaggerated look of horror on her face.

“Shut up,” Jared rolls his eyes as he gets out of the car, lifting up the seat so Janie can clumsily crawl out of the back.

She points at him after she looks at the house, scowling. “This is your house.”

“Yep,” Jared answers patiently. “We talked about this in the car.”

Janie narrows her eyes, “I don’t remember that.”

Peter sighs, grabbing her purse out of the back seat and throwing it at her, “You were distracted by the moon.”

“That’s a lie, take me home,” Janie mutters, trying to get back in the car, and apparently having trouble with the door handles. She huffs, turning around, “I refuse to couch.”

Jared gives Peter a look, who shrugs but doesn’t laugh even though he obviously wants to, “Good, you can have Jared’s bed.”

“Uh-uh, my room has the bathroom,” Jared immediately argues, a little taken aback that this is happening so quickly. “She gets your bed.”

“Jesus, I’m not moving in,” Janie mutters, looking around their living room. “Who cleaned?”

“I did,” Pindar says, popping up from behind a counter with a spray bottle in his hand. “I was worried you weren’t coming home.”

Janie looks taken aback, “Me?”

Jared rolls his eyes, turning to Peter who very carefully only has his eyebrows up in amusement. It’s a ridiculous expression for someone to have when their face is half shifted.

“Is she drunk?” Pindar asks slowly, looking to Jared.

"Very,” Peter answers, grabbing Janie’s arm and heading towards the bedrooms.

 Pindar eyes their backs suspiciously, turning towards Jared with a narrow-eyed look, “If they are back together, I am leaving.”

 “Nah,” Jared answers with a careless wave. “Like you could leave anyway.”

 “I could,” Pindar mutters petulantly, kneeling back behind the bar. “I go to court all the time.”

 Jared snorts, turning around on his heel. He walks back towards Peter’s room, peeking in the door to see Peter’s hands covering his face as Janie the Wolf rolls around in his bed sheets. Her wolf is almost red where Peter’s is brown, and she’s got a splash of white going down her nose, exemplified by the fact she appears to be snarling at a pillow.

 “I have no idea where my life went so wrong,” Peter says without uncovering his face.

 “Leave it for tomorrow,” Jared pitches, “Make her clean it up.”

 “She won’t clean it up,” Peter sighs, looking at Jared after another deep breath. “She’s like you.”

 “Bite your tongue,” Jared says with a pointed finger, leaning in the door to take a picture with the other hand. “I think I’ll put this on Facebook.”

 “Don’t even think about it,” Peter says, before he turns to Janie and growls something at her. She barely reacts with more than a haughty tail wave, and grips the duvet tighter between her teeth. “Tell her to stop, man.”

 Jared gives him a weird look, “Why would she listen to me?” 

 “Why did any of those wolves listen to you?” Peter responds.

Jared sighs, feeling a little silly as he takes a deeper breath and lowering his voice, “Janie, _stop_.”

Janie freezes for a moment, jaw going slack as she eyes Jared suspiciously. It only lasts a moment though, before she grabs the covers and rolls herself into them, muzzle the only part of her visible.

“Well, I tried,” Jared shrugs. “And she has stopped.”

“There’s going to be wolf hair everywhere tomorrow,” Pindar says from behind him with a disgusted tone. “You creatures never stop shedding.”

Jared tips his head towards his chest to keep from laughing as Peter scowls contemptuously, first at Pindar and then at Janie.

“You all suck,” Peter groans, “And it’s the full moon so I can’t even get laid.”

“What?” Jared whines, realizing what that means immediately, “That’s not fair.”

Pindar stares at him for a moment, then to Peter, before he makes a gagging noise. “No untoward stuff is allowed in the common areas, ever.”

Hey,” Jared snaps, drawing everyone’s attention, “This is _our_ house, not Pindar’s house.”

“Pindar is here at ten times as much as Peter and Jared,” Pindar defends haughtily. “Pindar’s vote should count regardless of mortgage signatures.”

“Pindar should stop talking in the third person,” Carmen mutters, peeking out her door. “What’s going on.”

“Peter manned up,” Jared says, “But he won’t put out.”

“Ah,” Carmen says after a moment. “Well shut up, I’m trying to watch a movie.”  She slams the door hard enough that Peter winces, rubbing at his ear.

“I hate you all,” Pindar mutters, slinking back towards the living room.

“Come on, Pindy,” Jared yells after him, towards Carmen’s door just because he can, “You’re hanging out with Karp too much.”

“We’ll revoke your friend rights if we have too,” Peter yells in agreement.

“You’re not my real parents,” Pindar shouts back.

Jared turns to Peter with an exaggerated pout, “Ouch, that really hurt.”

Peter answers with a disappointed shake of his head, lupine features melding back to human as he steps forward, “He doesn’t respect our authority.” 

Jared shrugs as Peter turns out the bedroom light, both of them ignoring Janie’s low pitched whine as they cross into Jared’s room. Jared grabs the lapels of Peter’s shirt, pulling him down and nearly tripping him as they shuffle further into his room, eager to get on the bed.

“I’m serious,” Peter mutters, pulling back. “No sex on the full moon.”

Jared whines low in his throat, slipping his fingers up through Peter’s hair, “Come on - “

“Do you want claws on your dick?” Peter says with a near breathless laugh, hand curling around Jared’s hip. “Because my control is a little wiggy right now.”

Jared honestly thinks about it, but in the end just gives a deep put-upon sigh, laying his forehead on Peter’s collarbone, “I bet your mom wouldn’t have this problem.”

Peter groans, pushing him away, “Don’t talk about my mom right now.”

Jared laughs as he turns around, going for his dresser and digging out a t-shirt, “Whatever, you know it’s true.”

“Seriously,” Peter says, pointing at him. “Stop it.” 

“We could call and ask, I’m sure she’d love to talk about it,” Jared says conversationally, smirking when he turns around and Peter’s nearly got a full on glower going on.  He looks down his shirt as he unbuttons it and wonders if he should do some sort of strip thing, but in the end just pulls it off and grabs the t-shirt without any fanfare, figuring a strip tease without any happy ending would just turn around and frustrate everyone more than anything.

He’s about to say something to that effect when Peter turns off the light, the room falling into nearly complete darkness as his eyes try to adapt. He yelps when Peter shoves him onto the bed, somehow managing to ninja them under the covers and then just lying on his chest and staying there, unmoving except for breathing.

“You’re such a creep,” Jared mutters after a moment, wrenching an arm out of the pin and laying it on Peter’s head, where it’s stuck at the juncture of his head and neck. “How did you even get your clothes off so quick?”

“Werewolf secret,” Peter mumbles, his lips brushing softly against Jared’s neck.

Jared rolls his eyes, stretching a little bit so that he doesn’t feel so suffocated, and takes a deep breath, letting his exhaustion catch up with him. He’s nearly asleep when he feels Peter mutter something against his neck, but he can’t quite make it out.  “What?” he rasps.

“Why are you being so calm about the gay thing?” Peter asks slowly.

Jared huffs, rolling his eyes, “Okay, don’t freak out, but... Do you remember when we went to the Hightower fifteen year reunion?”

“At Terranea?”

“Yeah," Jared confirms slowly. "Remember that guy who kept trying to talk to me alone but I kept dragging you into the conversation?” he asks, grimacing into the dark.

“That guy with the crazy eyebrows?”” Peter responds, sounding skeptical.

“No, that was some guy who wanted a donation for the school,” Jared mutters, rolling his eyes. “I mean the guy with the hipster glasses that kept ordering around the wait staff and touching my shoulder.”

“With the purple polo?” Peter asks, tone disbelieving. “Who you kept calling Mr. Creepy on the ride home?”

Jared sighs, “The reason he kept trying to get me alone is because he was sort of a guy that I used to mess around with after drama class.”

“Sort of?” Peter repeats dryly.

“ _Did_ , whatever, and I don’t know how you didn’t notice, but he kept dropping hints about hooking up while we were there.” Jared groans, “Right in front of you, too.”

“Mr. Creepy,” Peter repeats, “You hooked up, more than once, with a guy who you now refer to as only ‘Mr. Creepy.”

“I made bad decisions in high school,” Jared mutters, closing his eyes. “He didn’t used to be so creepy.”

“What did you mean, right in front of me?” Peter asks after a moment of silence, nearly lulling Jared into the false sense that he was actually going to be able to sleep sometime tonight.

Jared sighs, “Over half my graduating class thinks we’re married.”

“So he wanted you to cheat with him?” Peter says, a soft growl entering his voice. “He wasn’t even half as attractive as I am.”

Jared runs a hand through Peter’s hair as he shrugs, “Turns out he grew up to be a total sleeze.”

“He looked like Ronny Streppi,” Peter mutters tiredly, rubbing his nose against Jared’s collarbone. “I am a way better catch.”

Jared’s next exhale is nearly a laugh, “I’m glad you’re acting like there was actually competition.”

“Apparently there was,” Peter mumbles sullenly.

Jared just closes his eyes, because he’s not about to admit that the reason he went out with Chris was because he used to sort of look like Peter in low light. ”I guess I was just really easy in high school?”

“You’re really easy now.”

“Shut up, I am not,” Jared mutters, warmth quickly encouraging him to sleep.  

“Wanted to have sex in a bathroom,” Peter accuses lazily.

“Said we couldn’t, cause,” Jared mutters, flexing his hand over Peter’s pointedly. “Claws.”

Peter mumbles something intelligible into Jared’s chest, shoving him over until he is only half on top of him, arm curled around his waist.

The last thing Jared registers is Peter’s hand flexing at his hip, too tired to make a disapproving comment about scratches in the morning.  

 ~ 

When Jared wakes up on the edge of the bed, nearly falling off, he first remembers Peter, and then remembers that Peter definitely doesn’t have breasts.

He opens his eyes slowly, wondering if there’s been some sort of universe switching, he’s heard rumors around the office, but instead there’s a shock of blonde hair spread across his pillow, and Janie’s very naked body lying on top of the covers.

He’ll deny later that he let out a strangled screech, insisting that it was some sort of manly gasp of terror, but either way he ends up on the floor, crab walking backwards into a bookshelf and very nearly getting crushed by Star Wars figurines.

“What the hell?!” Jared yells at her, but Janie does nothing but groan in pain, sticking her head under a pillow.

Peter leans in the door a second later with a wide and sadistic grin on his face, “Oh, you’re awake?”

“I’m kicking you all out,” Jared mutters, sticking his face into his palms. “Why the fuck is she in my bed?”

“She crawled in at about 3am in wolf form, whining like a puppy,” Peter shrugs, as if such a thing is anywhere near a rational answer. “The full moon makes her weird.”

“I hate wolves, so much.” 

“At least she’s hung over?” Peter offers, holding out a hand to lever him up.

“Can I throw water on her?” Jared wonders, attempting to wander into the bathroom.

Peter scoffs, pulling him in the opposite direction, out of the room, and shutting the door, “Not unless you want to get bitten.”

“Then I could be a werewolf too,” Jared argues, slipping his hand up Peter’s and lacing their fingers together. “It’s win-win.”

“We both know that’s impossible,” Peter disagrees with zero sympathy. “But you _would_ probably get a horrible infection.”

“Whatever,” Jared huffs sullenly, trying to pull Peter towards his room. “She’s too hung-over to move that fast anyway.”

Peter stops him at the door jam, “We have work, and you have morning breath.”

Jared gives Peter a disbelieving look that’s returned by a simple shrug. “The world is against me,” he declares sullenly, unthreading his fingers from Peter’s and walking towards the other entrance to his bathroom. He’s halfway through his morning routine before he looks up at the mirror, scowling suspiciously at his own reflection.                                            

He marches into the living room and stands in front of where Peter sits on the couch, finishing off a cup of coffee and still in his boxers.

“Hm?” Peter looks up at him, smirk barely restrained. 

“You’re an asshole,” Jared says flatly. “We don’t have to work until Monday.”

Peter considers him, tilting his head and pulling on the edge of Jared’s half-buttoned vest. “I do really like the vests.”

“Oh, really,” Jared says dryly, moving closer and setting his hands on Peter’s shoulders to staring down at him. He shifts his hand and runs his thumb up the side of Peter’s jaw, “Three days.” 

“Three days,” Peter repeats softly. He runs his hands up Jared’s torso, slipping his fingers under the vest and around his back, thumbs catching on his waistband. He pulls Jared closer, arms circling around his back.

Jared obligingly follows, straddling Peter’s thighs and sliding his arms around his neck to comfortably lean forward and kiss him, groaning when Peter pulls his shirt out of the back of his pants to slip his hand under, gripping the skin underneath. After a moment, he pulls one of his arms out from behind Peter’s head to run it down his chest, clutching at the muscle as he feels down his shoulder to his hip, enjoying the near breathless groan Peter exhales as they pull apart.

“We should have been doing this forever,” Peter mutters, leaning forward for another short kiss, and then to start planting them against the line of Jared’s jaw, who moans a little and rewards him with a hand tweaking at a nipple.

Jared’s shirt is slowly coming undone without him even noticing, but just as his other hand is about to bravely venture into Peter's shorts, Peter lets out a full body flinch and covers his ears, almost pushing Jared off of his lap.

“Whoa, what the fuck,” Jared groans, unhappy that this is pretty much the third time he’s been cockcblocked in the last twenty-four hours. Second that it's actually been _by Peter_.

“What the hell is that noise,” Janie’s hoarse shriek reverberates from the back of the house. “Stop or I’ll kill it.”

Jared doesn’t actually hear anything, but judging by the fact Peter’s trying to burrow his head into the cushions it seems to be real. After a moment, however, Peter seems to relax, his entire body releasing the tension that had struck it a moment earlier.

“It was horrible, Jared,” Peter whines softly, leaning his head against Jared’s chest. “The only time I’d heard something like that was… Wait - ” he lifts his head and glares towards the back of the house. “Pindar.”

“Pindar?” Jared repeats incredulously. “Is there some kind of high pitched vampire scream I don’t know about?”

Peter gently pushes Jared off and gets up, stalking towards the library. Behind the doors, they find Pindar cowering and Carmen softly laughing, hands cupped over her mouth and a tiny silver whistle clutched in Pindar’s fist, which he’s holding curled to his chest like some sort of protection charm.

“What, the fuck,” Peter growls and lets his face wolf out, canines extending threateningly. “This is a very strong instinct you’re messing with here, Pindar.”

“The instinct to kill me, or the instinct to have _sex_ on the _couch_ ,” Pindar says meanly, sticking his nose up, which would probably be taken more seriously if his hands weren’t shaking so hard that the chain on the whistle jingles.

Peter growls again, approaching Pindar, who flinches and throws the whistle at them, diving behind Carmen for protection.

Jared catches it, holding it between his fingers. “Is this a dog whistle?”

“Yes,” Peter answers stiffly, rubbing at an ear. “They’re fucking inhumane.”

“Karp gave it to me for Christmas,” Pindar explains, looking over Carmen’s shoulder. “I chose not - Janie!  Are... What is - ? I can’t even think now.”

Jared and Peter turn around to the sight of a pissed off Janie, half wolf and still completely naked, looking like she’s about to wring Pindar’s neck. Jared grimaces, making a disgusted noise at the memory of this morning, and rolls his eyes at her.

Janie shushes Pindar harshly, rubbing at her temple. “Please, tell me I wasn’t in Jared’s bed for... Eugh, totally thought that threesome offer was a joke.”

“Ew,” Jared responds immediately, “It definitely was; I would never have sex with _you_.”

“Ew,” Janie mocks, “Then where the fuck are my clothes, _Jared_.”

Pindar makes a choked noise, and Peter turns on him.  “Hey!” he growls, snapping his fingers and pointing at him. “Stop staring, it’s rude.”

“Whatever, let him stare,” Janie interrupts carelessly. “If he touches I’ll just bite his hand off.”

Pindar squeaks, ducking behind Carmen’s shoulder again, an impressive feat considering her size.

Carmen shrugs Pindar off and rolls her eyes at them, plucking the whistle out of Jared’s fingers as she shoulders past him, “The morning officially just got a little too crazy for me, I’m out.”

Pindar hurries after her, carefully avoiding Janie as he walks around her. Peter and Janie both relax slightly, at least enough that they’re no longer half wolf, growling stuff at each other.

“I just want to get laid,” Jared whines, rolling his eyes towards the ceiling.

“Me too,” Peter agrees petulantly, finally speaking human and pushing Janie out the door, slamming it closed and ignoring her irritated growling.

Jared raises his eyebrows at Peter, who stands stiffly against the door and starting a session of awkward staring, that is until Peter’s eyes stray down to Jared’s half-done shirt.

“To be honest,” Jared starts, “I don’t really need a mood to have sex. Kind of just good anywhere.”

“Oh,” Peter says shortly, looking up. “Good.”

The moment they make eye contact, as Peter licks his upper lip, is justifiably electric, and Jared finds himself near bursting with sudden want as Peter grabs his shirt and pulls him in for a rough kiss.

Jared’s vest is off nearly instantly, and the shirt is quickly behind it, as Peter pushes him towards the couch. He grips Peter’s hips as they fall and groans as their groins make contact, but is subsequently forced to balance on Peter’s shoulders as the other man shifts so that he’s lying down as Jared straddles his hips. Jared takes a moment to look down, breathing hard and taking in the fact that this is actually happening, before Peter breaks the moment by mumbling something about wearing too many clothes.

He agrees wholeheartedly, half-second of romanticism forgotten, and hastily unbuttons his pants as Peter tries to pull them down, laughing into his mouth as he shimmies Peter’s boxers off in return. Jared could die right now and be cool with it, if he was being honest, especially when Peter grabs his hips and shoves upwards so they can grind against each other.

 Jared can barely think, and doesn’t really want to, as fairly quickly most of his senses become completely immersed in Peter’s skin, mouth, cock. It’s everything that sex has never been, but should have, and he’s got just barely enough mind to pull away from where he’s sucking a hickey into Peter’s neck as a hand reaches around his ass.

 “Don’t even think about it,” He breathes, stroking his hand up against Peter’s nipple just to watch him squirm. “No lube in the library.”

 Peter moans, “I wasn’t even thinking...  Wasn’t, anyway.”

 “I was,” Jared smirks, groaning as Peter takes retribution in the form of a saliva-slicked hand around both their dicks, the resulting friction nearly unbearable, and Jared can’t help but clench his hands in reflex, nails digging into Peter’s shoulder and chest.

They’re not even actually fucking and Jared can barely hold himself back, finds himself wondering if this is some sort of freaky werewolf thing or just the fact it’s finally _, finally_ Peter.

Jared leans forward and bites into Peter’s shoulder, tangling his fingers with his as they rock. He grins at the sound of a familiar pitched groan, a sign that Peter’s about to come, satisfyingly unseparated by walls, his heart beating rapidly under Jared’s spread palm. The sight of Peter in such ecstasy has Jared quickly following, one hand clenching at Peter’s chest as the other squeezes his hand.

The moment is gone too quickly, and the couch squeaks unattractively as he breathes heavy, collapsed against Peter’s chest.

“You scratched the hell out of me,” Peter says after a few minutes, still slightly breathless. “I can still feel it.”

Jared laughs shortly, looking up at him through his eyelashes, “Did they last, what, a second?”

“Feels like they’re still there,” Peter repeats, an odd tone in his voice.

Jared groans as he sits up, curious enough to forego the traditional nap to look down at Peter’s chest. He raises his eyebrows at the sight of flushed streaks, and traces a finger down the marks, surprised that they’re mostly still there, fading slower than any other injury Peter has ever gotten.

“How long did it take that time you stabbed yourself to heal?” Jared asks curiously, lifting his hand to trace the teeth marks at the juncture of Peter’s shoulder, enjoying the slight hitch in breath.

Peter sighs in thought, “A couple seconds? I don’t remember.” He pushes lazily at Jared’s side, “If you don’t move, we’re going to be really gross soon.”

Jared grimaces, rolling, and that half second of forgetting that they’re on a goddamned couch has him suddenly on the floor, rubbing a rug-burned shoulder and grumbling.

“Are you okay?” Peter asks, looking down at him, expression strained from holding back laughter.

“That was totally on purpose,” Jared claims sarcastically, standing up and grabbing Peter’s boxers off the edge of the couch, wiping off his stomach, and then throwing them at Peter, who catches them with a disgusted look and begrudgingly does the same, frowning.

“Of course we use _my_ only clothes.”

Jared shrugs dismissively, “You like being naked anyway.” He fishes his own underwear out of his pants to pull them on, and picks up his shirt from where it inexplicably landed across a chair.

He pauses before he opens the door, and turns to Peter, “Is Janie still here?”

Peter gives him a narrow look, but his head tilts in a tell-tale sign that he’s listening anyway, “I don’t think _anyone_ is here, actually.”

“Awesome,” Jared declares, pulling open the door.

Peter pushes past him, apparently eager to get clothes for the first time since Jared met him. He curls his hand over the back of Jared’s neck, a slight but pointed gesture.

It’s not so much the touch itself that has Jared stopping Peter, but the fact that the moment of contact had it feeling like his heart literally stopped just so it could sync with Peter’s.

“What the hell,” Peter grumbles as Jared grabs an arm with both his hands.

“You’re not telling me something,” Jared says suspiciously, experimenting with the touch. It’s not overwhelming unless Peter’s skin is against an artery, but the fact he can feel Peter’s _heart_ reverberating almost as an answer to his own is definitely not normal, which leaves the obvious answer of supernatural bullshit.

Peter shifts awkwardly as Jared messes around, muscles tensing, “I don’t know what’s going on either,” he says uncomfortably. “I’ve always kind of been able to do that, but never like this.”

“Do what,” Jared asks, “The heartbeat thing? Caused that’s a little weird.”

“I’m not positive, okay, but pretty sure that you’re feeling what I’ve felt... forever.”

“Since we were ten?” Jared asks dubiously.

“Can literally feel your heartbeat for miles,” Peter answers reluctantly as he tries to pull away. “Hear you from further away than I can anyone else, smell you; I didn’t know any of that would –transfer.”

Jared refuses to let go, getting dragged into Peter’s room as a result, “That’s kind of creepy,” Jared comments frankly. “But also kind of cool; is that how you knew I left the office? Or whenever I snuck out to your house? Or that time I passed out in the Hilton pool?”

“Pretty much,” Peter agrees, looking slightly embarrassed. “And that was horrible, you almost died.”

 “Aw, don’t look so down, there was only a little drowning.” Jared comforts good naturedly, still refusing to let go of Peter’s arm as he digs through dresser drawers.

“Stop talking about it,” Peter says with a grimace, forcibly pulling his arm away so he can put on his clothes.

Jared frowns as the feeling fades, crossing his arms and abruptly feeling cold. He darts out a hand after Peter gets done pulling on a shirt, unable to help himself, and sighs as the feeling returns for an instant before Peter pulls away to give him an odd look.

“Shut up,” Jared mutters, ignoring the heat flooding his cheeks. “Starting to get used to it.”

“Yeah, well,” Peter rolls his eyes, but there’s a grin growing at the corner of his mouth. “I doubt it’s going to go away.”

Jared’s smiling back before even realizing it, the sight surprising as he turns and catches the expression in Peter’s mirror. He grins wider and turns to Peter, saying pointedly, “Great, ‘cause so far this relationship has been far too vanilla for me.”

Peter gives him a disbelieving look before starting to laugh, “You’re so obnoxious,” he says, meeting Jared halfway for a kiss.

**Author's Note:**

> This turned out way too long, and yes, I did steal the title from Assassins Creed. I couldn't find a soul-bonding fic, and since I am a huuuuge sucker for those, I decided I'd just write one with added urban-fantasy universe things.
> 
> If you find any grammatical errors (like HUGE ones) or typos, please notify me. I tried to go over this with a comb, but it might've been missing a few teeth,


End file.
